Imagine you are walking through a city park and spot a bag that appears to contain valuable items, with no one else around. You realize the bag belongs to someone who will likely return soon to retrieve it. Should you take it yourself? After all, you could use some extra financial help given your recent economic hardships! No one is there to see you. If no one will ever know, what is the problem with taking it? It might be a small loss to the owner, but it would be a significant gain for you! Why not?

Imagine you have a friend who is a bit shy and struggles to express himself in social situations. And say that he is known to be picked on by his peers, or being bullied. You have every opportunity to tease him and get a laugh at his expense. But he isn’t responding well to your jokes. Who cares? You just want to have fun, and he’ll be fine—won’t he?

Imagine you’ve just finished a refreshing drink and are left holding the empty plastic bottle. You’re out in nature, and no one is around to see if you toss the bottle into the woods. You know it’s bad for the environment, and you can already see other people’s litter scattered nearby—but who cares? What’s one more bottle on top of the rest? It’s not going to make a big difference, right?

Who knows? Who cares? Maybe no one will ever find out. Maybe no one will ever care. But more than anyone else, besides the All-Knowing One, you know the truth

When you steal something or do something wrong, even if no one is there to call you a thief, you are the one who labels yourself as such. You know it. You know that you have become a petty thief. In the end, you declare who you are to yourself.

When you insult or attack someone, even if you can get away with it, you define your identity as a person who transgresses against others. You declare that you are a transgressor. Even if others do not know or care, you know the truth. With every challenging decision we make, we declare who we are. We say “This is who I am.” And all these decisions ultimately shape our identity [1].

How we identify ourselves shapes our mindset and influences every aspect of our lives.

If you see yourself as a petty, opportunistic thief, you’ll assume that everyone else is a thief in one way or another. If you are involved in fraudulent activities, you’ll suspect others are fraudsters just like you—or, if they aren’t, you might consider them naïve or weak. If you see life as a constant struggle to survive, you’ll believe that every human, animal, and plant is locked in battle. The whole universe becomes a war zone, and people live in fear. On the contrary, if you are a peaceful person who respects others, you’ll notice beauty in people and in the world around you. You’ll think about the harmony and peace in others. As the saying goes, “A person who sees the good in things has good thoughts. And he who has good thoughts receives pleasure from life” [2].

The one who truly suffers from a wrongful act is not the person who is harmed, but the person who commits the act. Those who are wronged often recover, move on, or learn and grow from their experiences. But the one who inflicts harm is shaping a destiny that may be hard to change for the rest of their life. As people continue to respond to events in the same way, their reactions become hardwired; a part of their very biology. With every action we take, we determine our identities. Similarly, the true beneficiary of a good act is the person who performs it. Surprisingly, helping others is not that easy as it sounds. The odds of being in the right place at the right time, with the right resources to help, are slim at best. Simply handing out free money may look like kindness, but it can sometimes cause more harm than good in the long run—for instance, studies have shown that lottery winners often end up worse off than before. That’s why, when we find ourselves with a genuine opportunity to help someone, we should see it as a rare chance to make a difference in someone’s life—a gift to be cherished. By doing good, we shape our own identity.

We observe the outer world through the mirrors within us. From this, we can build a recipe for happiness: if we want to enjoy our lives, we must start by reshaping our own identity. If we want real change, it begins by changing who we believe ourselves to be.

Identity change

Changing our identity is one of the most difficult things we can do in life. Human beings have a curious resistance to any kind of change. We get used to certain routines and stick with them—this is true for our personalities, careers, where we live, and more. Once we settle into a habit, not only does it stay with us, but we’re also reluctant to let it go. As Tony Robbins says, “The strongest force in human personality is the need to stay consistent with how we define ourselves.”

So, what do we do when we want to change? People often want to build good habits and get rid of bad ones. We all know how difficult it is to start doing something regularly. Even when we’re fully aware of the benefits, knowing alone isn’t enough to create change. I know that I should exercise more, eat less, read more, and so on, but turning these actions into habits is the challenging part.

A much easier way to build new habits is through the identity-based behavior change [3]. Instead of focusing on tactics alone, it’s more effective to associate your identity with the kind of person who naturally displays those habits. his method begins by deciding who you want to be. Then, ask yourself what that person would do in a given situation, and start acting accordingly.

Next, give yourself permission to achieve small wins in the direction of your new identity. Trying to change your behavior without first changing how you see yourself is unlikely to succeed. If you want to act honestly, you need to become an honest person. If you want to achieve certain business outcomes, you have to become someone who accomplishes those goals—an entrepreneur. The more clearly you envision yourself as that person, the more likely you are to act in alignment. Prove to yourself who you are by taking the necessary steps.

A similar approach to behavior change can also be found in faith traditions which encourage people to do good deeds by connecting actions to their identities. For example, in the Qur’an 3:76, it is stated: “Absolutely! Those who honor their trusts and shun evil, surely God loves those who are mindful of Him.” In this verse, the person who is loved by God is depicted through their actions. The reader is encouraged to adopt the identity of such a person. If you want to be loved by God, you must become someone who honors trusts, avoids evil, and remains mindful of Him. By embracing this identity, you place yourself among those who are loved by Him. If we want to change our lives, we have to start changing who we are. Our identity and personality are what shape our personal reality [4]. We cannot change until we transform how we think, how we respond, how we act, and how we feel.

Nothing changes in our lives until we change ourselves.

I do not exploit other people’s weaknesses. I care for the environment. I serve tea to my significant other. I do not thrive at the expense of others. I respect differences of opinion. I strive to do my work well. I believe in human dignity and freedom. Why?

Because this is who I am.

References

¹ How to make hard choices, TED Talks, Ruth Chang.

² Seeds of reality, 50th seed. Bediuzzaman Said Nursi.

³ Atomic Habits, James Clear.

⁴ Joe Dispenza.

In November 2022, New York University announced startling research led by researchers at Grossman School of Medicine and elsewhere. Some 25 hospitals in the United States and the United Kingdom participated in the study which involved 567 men and women whose hearts stopped beating while hospitalized and underwent cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR). Despite immediate treatment, only 53 people recovered sufficiently to be discharged from the hospital. Six of the 28 participants interviewed remembered unusual experiences. The press release states: “Survivors reported having unique lucid experiences, including a perception of separation from the body, observing events without pain or distress, and a meaningful evaluation of life, including of their actions, intentions, and thoughts toward others. The researchers found these experiences of death to be different from hallucinations, delusions, illusions, dreams, or CPR-induced consciousness.”

Sam Parnia, the lead study investigator and an intensive care physician, who is also an associate professor in the Department of Medicine at NYU Langone Health, has been researching people who have come back to life after their heart, respiration, and brain activities have stopped. Dr. Parnia presented the study findings at a resuscitation science symposium which was a part of the American Heart Association’s Scientific Sessions 2022. In his speech, he mentioned patients who stated that they had a very clear evaluation of life and gave some examples. One of them said: “I was given a life review. During the review, we revisit scenes from our lives.” Another person said, “I saw my entire life in great detail and experienced feelings through it of satisfaction, shame, repentance.” And another one said: “I then saw things in rapid succession that were moments of my life.”

In a press release from NYU Langone Health in April 2022, it was stated that for decades, people who have survived an encounter with death have recalled unexplained lucid episodes involving heightened consciousness and awareness. These have been reported using the popular—yet scientifically ill-defined—term “near-death experiences.” According to the press release, a research team led by Dr. Sam Parnia examined the accumulated scientific evidence to date and published the research results in the Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences. The researchers in the study represent many medical disciplines and represent many of the world’s most respected academic institutions. According to the study, thanks to advances in resuscitation and critical care medicine, many people have survived encounters with death or being near death. These people have consistently described recalled experiences surrounding death, which involve a unique set of mental recollections with universal themes; they follow a specific narrative arc involving a perception of (a) separation from the body with a heightened, vast sense of consciousness and recognition of death; (b) travel to a destination; (c) a meaningful and purposeful review of life, involving a critical analysis of all actions, intentions and thoughts towards others; a perception of (d) being in a place that feels like “home”, and (e) a return back to life. “We took hundreds of people’s experiences and merged them together so that we could pull out clusters of experiences, and come up with a common definition” Parnia told The Telegraph. According to the article in The Telegraph, many people remember leaving their bodies. Some report being able to see in all directions, or hovering in space, sometimes connected to their own body by a cord. Others recall being drawn through a tunnel or seeing their entire life in review, including how their actions impacted others.

Dr. Sam Parnia gave an example of the cases they’ve been studying in his speech at the New York Academy of Sciences Symposium in 2019: “… then I began a review of my life, the key moments of my life. But at the same time, I was reexperiencing it from other people’s points of view. And that was a stunt because you feel that pain, you feel the sting, you feel the hurt. So what I saw was my own lies and my own self-deception to myself, which I had used to convince myself that doing certain things was okay. Because people had deserved that. I was not experiencing the emotional impact it had on other people. I felt their pain. I felt the shock.”

Dr. Parnia talked about the brain and consciousness at the TV show “Closer to Truth” in 2021. He said: “… So the heart stops, the person stops breathing immediately because no blood is flowing. There’s no oxygen delivered to the body. The brain shuts down within seconds, and it flatlines completely. … And we used to think that brain cells, neurons only had like five or 10 minutes before they became irreversibly damaged and we realized that’s not true. … However, today, we’ve managed to discover ways to essentially manipulate those processes by which cells are dying in a person who has just died. And we start the heart thus bring the person back to life. Not just minutes, but hours after they’ve died. … We cannot deny that human beings are conscious thinking entities and that essentially, we don’t want to bring back a husk, a shell. We want to bring back a whole person with full consciousness, the mind, the psyche, the soul of the person with them. And so we study consciousness after the period of death after someone’s gone through cardiac arrest. And what we’re beginning to demonstrate is that actually contrary to our perceptions, consciousness does not become annihilated, just because a person has just died. … When you examine the results of studies in people who have gone through clinical death through cardiac arrest for these ever-extended periods of time, we see that there are clear cases where people’s consciousness has continued, but the brain has flatlined.”

The results of a large-scale study sponsored by the University of Southampton were published in 2014 in the journal Resuscitation. The study involved patients from 15 hospitals in England, America and Austria. 2060 people had cardiac arrest during the study. Of the 330 survivors, some of them could not be interviewed for reasons such as being very ill and of the 140 patients interviewed, 55 reported perceptions of awareness. (Although no patient demonstrated clinical signs of consciousness during CPR.) Scientists included the patients’ descriptions of their experiences in the Resuscitation article. One of them said: “I have come back from the other side of life… God sent (me) back, it was not (my) time—(I) had many things to do… (I traveled) through a tunnel toward a very strong light, which didn’t dazzle or hurt (my) eyes… there were other people in the tunnel whom (I) did not recognize. When (I) emerged… (He described a very beautiful crystal city)… there was a river that ran through the middle of the city (with) the most crystal clear waters…” A 57 year old man described the perception of observing events from the top corner of the room and continued to experience a sensation of looking down from above. According to the article he accurately described people, sounds, and activities from his resuscitation and his medical records corroborated his accounts and specifically supported his descriptions and the use of an automated external defibrillator.

Cardiologist Dr. Pim Van Lommel and colleagues also published startling research in The Lancet, one of the most prestigious medical journals. The study included 344 cardiac patients who were successfully resuscitated after cardiac arrest in ten Dutch hospitals. The research team found 62 patients had experiences such as out of body experience, moving through a tunnel and meeting with deceased persons. During the pilot phase in one of the hospitals, a coronary-care-unit nurse reported a veridical out-of-body experience of a resuscitated patient. She said, during a night shift an ambulance brought in a 44-year-old cyanotic, comatose man into the coronary care unit. After admission, he received artificial respiration without intubation, while heart massage and defibrillation are also applied. When they wanted to intubate the patient, he turns out to have dentures in his mouth. The nurse removes these upper dentures and puts them onto the ‘crash car.’ Meanwhile, they continue extensive CPR. After about an hour and a half, the patient had sufficient heart rhythm and blood pressure, but he is still ventilated and intubated, and he is still comatose. He was transferred to the intensive care unit. After more than a week, she meets him again and distributes his medication. The nurse described the incident: “The moment he sees me he says: ‘Oh, that nurse knows where my dentures are.’ I am very surprised. Then he elucidates: ‘Yes, you were there when I was brought into hospital and you took my dentures out of my mouth and put them onto that car, it had all these bottles on it and there was this sliding drawer underneath and there you put my teeth.’ I was especially amazed because I remembered this happening while the man was in deep coma and in the process of CPR. When I asked further, it appeared the man had seen himself lying in bed, that he had perceived from above how nurses and doctors had been busy with CPR. He was also able to describe correctly and in detail the small room in which he had been resuscitated as well as the appearance of those present like myself. At the time that he observed the situation he had been very much afraid that we would stop CPR and that he would die. And it is true that we had been very negative about the patient’s prognosis due to his very poor medical condition when admitted. The patient tells me that he desperately and unsuccessfully tried to make it clear to us that he was still alive and that we should continue CPR. He is deeply impressed by his experience and says he is no longer afraid of death. 4 weeks later he left the hospital as a healthy man.”

Bruce Greyson, emeritus of psychiatry and neurobehavioral sciences at the University of Virginia, is one of the world’s leading authorities on near-death experience research. Greyson interviewed many people who have had these experiences throughout his career. He recently appeared on NPR and said the near-death experiences that many people had included strong emotions, like a sense of overwhelming peace and well-being, an experience of unconditional love, a sense of being outside the physical body.  In his speech on NPR Greyson said: “I’ve got story after story of people who couldn’t go back to the same profession, people who were, say, career police officers who couldn’t shoot after a near-death experience, of people who were in competitive businesses who no longer felt it was meaningful to get ahead at someone else’s expense. And they had to change their careers. They often go into helping careers – you know, health care, teaching, social work, clergy, that sort of thing.” And he also said: “After 50 years of studying thousands of cases, I can’t deny that they happen and that they profoundly affect people’s lives and present us with things that we don’t have materialistic explanations for.”

Three cases

On the NPR show, Greyson gave an example from his book “After” which was published in 2021: He met a 25-year-old man named Jack, who kept having respiratory arrests and had to be resuscitated. Greyson said: “And his primary nurse, who worked with him every day, told him once that she was going to be leaving for the weekend, and some of the nurses would be substituting for her. So she left. And while she was away on the weekend, he had another respiratory arrest where he had to be resuscitated. And he found himself in a beautiful pastoral scene. And there, to his surprise this nurse, Anita comes walking towards him. And he does a double take and says, you know, Anita, what are you doing here? And she said you can’t stay here Jack. You need to go back to your body. And I want you to find my parents and tell them that I love them and I’m sorry I wrecked the red MGB. And then she turned and walked away. He then woke up back in his body in the hospital with a complete memory of this vivid experience and tried to tell this to the next nurse who walked into his room. And she quickly exited the room in tears. It turned out that his primary nurse, Anita, had taken the weekend off to celebrate her 21st birthday, and her parents surprised her with the gift of a red MGB. And she got excited, jumped in the car, took off for a test drive, lost control and crashed the car, dying instantly, just a few hours before he had his near-death experience.”

Penny Sartori, who worked as an intensive care nurse in England for 17 years, has a doctorate on near-death experiences and has written four books. Sartori describes one of the cases in her article published in the Daily Mail in 2014: “Take, for instance, the case of Fred Williams, a Swansea pensioner in his 70s who was suffering from the final stages of a terminal heart problem. One night in the hospital, he lost consciousness and we feared he was about to die. But he somehow managed to keep his faltering grip on life. And when he eventually came to (himself), I noticed at once that he looked very happy. My colleagues also remarked on this. By the following morning, Fred had recovered sufficiently to see his anxious relatives. To their astonishment, he told them that he’d been visited—while unconscious—by his mother and grandmother, both of whom were dead, as well as by his (living) sister. They’d just stood by his bedside, keeping vigil. ‘I couldn’t understand why my sister was there as well,’ he remarked. Unknown to him, his sister had actually died the week before. Fearing the news might jeopardize his recovery, his family had kept it from him. Poor Fred never learned the truth, and died a week later.”

Atif Khalil, an Associate Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Lethbridge in Canada, mentions an account shared through personal correspondence in his article published in Renovatio, the journal of Zaytuna College based in California: “A South African Muslim father recounted the NDE of his son, a drug addict who tried unsuccessfully to commit suicide, in which he met the family’s deceased Chishti Sufi shaykh, relatives who had died, as well as the Prophet Muĥammad (peace be upon him)—all of whom instructed him to return (to his life) to care for his child. The father’s conviction in the veridical nature of the son’s experience rested partly on the fact that, to the astonishment of his physicians, he not only made a virtually impossible recovery, eventually reforming his life, but also accurately described family members he had never met before.”

In an article published in 2014, Dr. Bruce Greyson and Nancy Evans Bush, President Emerita of the International Association for Near-Death Studies, wrote: “The great majority of near-death experiences (NDEs) reported publicly over the past four decades have been described as pleasant, even glorious. Almost unnoticed in the euphoria about them has been the sobering fact that not all NDEs are so affirming. Some are deeply disturbing.” They say a classic response to profound spiritual experience is conversion, not necessarily changing one’s religion but in the original sense of the Latin convertere meaning “to turn around.” And that the terrifying NDE is interpreted as a warning about unwise or wrong behaviors, and to turn one’s life around.

References

• https://nyulangone.org/news/lucid-dying-patients-recall-death-experiences-during-cpr
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XkgLBCATUgA
• https://nyulangone.org/news/recalled-experiences-surrounding-death-more-hallucinations
• https://nyaspubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/nyas.14740
• https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/05/07/near-death-experiences-will-studied-seriously-number-people/
• https://www.nyas.org/events/2019/what-happens-when-we-die-insights-from-resuscitation-science/
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j-Boi6rzQms
• https://www.resuscitationjournal.com/article/S0300-9572%2814%2900739-4/fulltext
• https://fountainmagazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/eqm-a5f.pdf
• https://www.npr.org/2022/07/14/1111473823/one-man-recounts-his-near-death-covid-story
• https://www.npr.org/transcripts/1111686005
• http://www.drpennysartori.com/media.html
• https://renovatio.zaytuna.edu/article/science-religion-and-the-challenge-of-near-death-experiences
• https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6173534/

Various studies exist about these compartments – which controls the expression of the soul through the body, which is responsible for memory, intelligence, belief, hatred and love. The brain’s two hemispheres have different functions and specialize in different areas. For example, linguistic abilities and tongue functions are usually controlled by the left hemisphere, while musical abilities and the ability to comment and analyze complex images are controlled by the right hemisphere. However, it is not possible to state that the forebrain functions independently from the hemispheres of the brain. The Wernicke’s area, located on the upper tail of the temporal lobe, is responsible for language comprehension, and the Angular Gyrus that is a mediator between sound and vision, is responsible for linguistic and mathematical operations. For this reason, the Angular Gyrus is accepted to be related with superior consciousness and intelligence. Scientists have proven that intelligence and consciousness decrease more dramatically upon the destruction of these areas when compared to the destruction of the forebrain. Therefore, for the spiritual functions to be able to operate in the body, it’s essential that these areas of the brain function.

The more accepted view, at least today, is that spiritual characteristics and personality function independent of the brain. A convincing proof disregarding this view is that during many tumor surgeries, even though the body’s vital activities remain intact, after removing tissue from the brain, spiritual characteristics sometimes degrade. Another proof is the surgery performed to remove the forebrain of depressed patients (a prefrontal lobotomy). The patients vital activities were not disrupted upon surgery and their mood improved for a while. For a short amount of time, patients stopped suffering from serious neurological and psychiatric disturbances. However, when the patients were observed several years after the surgery, it was concluded that the patients lacked the functions of the forebrain and these surgeries were abandoned. The most prevalent side effects related to the removal of the forebrain were:

• Loss of the ability to solve complex social problems,
• Loss of the ability to take sequential steps in order to resolve a complex problem,
• Loss of the ability to multitask,
• Loss of determination, effort and desire to do activities,
• Loss of the ability for a community response when faced with a problem,
• Loss of ethical values and the feeling of shame,
• Loss of coherent thought even though the ability to speak and understand what is said is not lost,
• Instant emotional changes: from kindness to frustration, passion, violence and insanity,
• Inability to use artistic or naturally existing talents for the sake of a purpose.

These dysfunctions made it apparent that there was a correlation between the forebrain and spiritual characteristics.

Single neurons, not from the human brain, were inoculated in the lab and an experiment was carried out.. Studies showed that these neurons were not a means to highly intellectual capabilities, such as intelligence; whereas when neurons taken from the forebrain were inoculated and experimented on, it was found that they were a means to uniquely human capabilities like intelligence. Complex problem solving and the capacity to make discoveries were found to be correlated with the forebrain. It is not possible to explain such a fact without taking the soul into consideration. Spiritual characteristics such as sadness, happiness, joy, peace, patience, compassion, and love are all the results of complex interactions within the brain. However, it is not convincing to say that they are only results of electrical or chemical interactions within the brain.

The prefrontal area is where all thoughts coming from lower brain areas (such as sight, hearing, and feeling cortex areas, and the thalamus and hypothalamus) are gathered and processed to be enriched. Many information and memories gathered from different parts of the brain come together in the prefrontal area to be synthesized into deeper thoughts. Active memory is when different pieces of information are synthesized together and form a thought; and this thought is later acted upon. This allows to accurately surmise future events, and to plan for them.

It also allows for a rapid, appropriate response to the signals gathered by the five sensory channels. It allows for predicting the consequences of actions before performing them and for resolving problems of a complex medical, mathematical, ethical, moral, or philosophical basis. It can also postpone emotional responses for an appropriate time, measure the consequences of verbal and physical communications, use will power to measure the ethical and moral consequences of actions, and use information gathered from all channels to diagnose a problem. People who have damaged prefrontal cortexes, have serious difficulty synthesizing information and processing it to form coherent thoughts (active memory). This situation shows us that the prefrontal cortex enables consciousness and highly intellectual actions.

Another function of the prefrontal cortex is to enable focus about a specific topic. Taking this into consideration, the prefrontal cortex is semi related to attention. An existing proof for this is that people with damaged prefrontal cortexes are unable to concentrate and their focus is easily disturbed. Individuals whose prefrontal cortex has been removed or damaged can acquire a spiritual consciousness; however due to their handicap, they are unable to express their thoughts in a serial and sensible fashion for more than a minute. They can be easily distracted from the original subject. The prefrontal cortex allows an individual to accomplish a process of thought despite distractions, and allows for communication between the soul and the mind.

To sum it up, the prefrontal cortex is correlated with intellectual characteristics such as consciousness, intelligence, and self control, and also relates to how well we perform our moral values. For example, if the prefrontal cortex is unable to function, the individual does not feel shame anymore. This makes people believe shame is related only to the prefrontal cortex. However, the brain is merely a bridge between the body and the soul. Our brain is a bridge and curtain for our soul, which is the source of our spiritual characteristics. When we physically have a problem with our brain, the soul carries on its existence as before, however it is unable to express its consciousness, intellect, and will power in this material world.

Before anasthesia, even routine surgeries were painful and dangerous. Its advent has allowed for amazing advances in public health and patient safety.

Humanity has faced various kinds of health problems throughout history, and will be facing them until the end of time. Even someone who has not yet suffered from an illness, will almost certainly suffer from one in the future. Let’s take a moment to reflect on all the people who are currently undergoing treatment at hospitals in the hopes of curing an illness.

From time to time we visit close friends and relatives who have undergone such operations. We wish them health and talk with them a little. We ask them how the operation felt, how many stitches they have. They usually say, “They injected me with something and I don’t remember the rest.” Then they may show us their gall bladder, wrapped in gauze, or their kidney stone, which was removed. Have you ever pondered how it is possible not to feel any pain during these kinds of operations, or how it is possible not to remember anything?

Surgical practices have advanced so much in present times. Heart, liver, and kidney transplants are now commonplace, as are finger and arm reattachments. Anesthesia, which makes all of these operations possible and painless, is a great blessing. Even the small and simple surgeries performed just 150 years ago were very difficult for surgeons – not to mention very painful for patients.

In his famous book on physiology and treatment, The Canon of Medicine the renowned 10th and 11th century scholar, Avicenna (Ibn-i Sina) (980-1037), defines anesthesia as, “a numbing and a cooling remedy.” He gives pathophysiological commentary on the influences of anesthetics and analgesics, and summarized painkilling methods as following:

1. A mixture prepared from linseed and dill should be applied to the area of pain.
2. Decreasing the sensitivity of the area of pain by increasing the moisture of the area, or providing narcotics for sleep.
3. Providing cooling and analgesic and anesthetic medicine.

Biruni, another Islamic scholar from the 11th century, documented his work with analgesic and anesthetic medicine. One of his writings recommends boiling the root tubers of henbane, Mandragora, horned poppy (Glaucium flavum), and Iris, together with the attar of roses and vinegar.

In his pharmacological works of the 12th and 13th centuries, Samarqandi recorded the analgesic, sedative (calming), anesthetic, and hypnotic effects of opium, mandragora, henbane, lettuce, beaver testicles, aloe vera, and coriander.

During the end of the 17th century, in Italy, anasthesia was performed by preventing the patients from breathing until they lost consciousness, and then immediately performing surgery on the patient who had fainted. This was called the asphyxia technique. The surgeries performed were relatively easy, such as the cutting of an arm or leg. The surgeon who was fast was considered the best, because patients could wake up during the surgery – that is, if they survived the procedure.

Another interesting anesthetic technique was making the patient lose consciousness by hitting them on the head. The hitting had to be done, “Hard enough to break the shell of an almond but gentle enough not to destroy its seed.” However, a bitter truth is that many patients were killed during this process.

Many have suffered the consequences of the absence of anesthesia in the past. Dr. Warren, a professor at Boston’s Massachusetts General Hospital in 1846, had placed his operating room on the very top floor of the hospital in order to avoid disturbing others with the screams of the suffering patients. One day, while examining one of patient’s tongues with pliers and a scalpel, he pulled the tongue of the patient without warning, and cut off his tongue with the scalpel. Afterwards, without hesitation, he cauterized his patient’s tongue with a hot iron. Dr. Warren observed the screaming, moaning, and suffering of the patients with no sign of emotion. He did not seem disturbed, and this was the exact attitude he needed in order to perform his duty. However, years later when enough advancement was done in the area of anesthesia, he couldn’t hold back his tears during the first operation that was performed with anesthesia.

Surgeries performed without anesthesia were hard on surgeon and patient alike. During his studies, the English gynecologist, Doctor James Young Simpson, fainted while cutting off a breast and considered quitting being a surgeon. Prof. Dr. Robert Liston was a famous surgeon at London University College. Dr. Liston had a reputation for being rude, arrogant, and strong. But he had no choice: he was forced to cut off a leg in 28 seconds, as anesthesia was not yet developed.

As can be seen from these examples, the absence of anesthesia, and the incredible suffering of the patients, pushed surgeons to be incredibly fast and emotionally insensitive. This period of time defined surgeons as strict, insensitive, and despotic. This went on until 1846, when William Thomas Morton performed the first surgery with anesthesia.

Since then, anesthesia has made surgeries much easier for all involved. Today, the definition of general anesthesia is total or partial loss of sensation in a human or animal body before surgical intervention.

Usually, anesthesia is performed by injecting medicine into the blood, or by making a patient breath an anesthetic gas. First, the patient loses consciousness, and then, with the help of muscle relaxants, the patient is put in a state of paralysis. Artificial respiration is performed until the end of the operation with the help of breathing machines called ventilators. For this purpose, an endotracheal tube is inserted in the windpipe of the patient and they are hooked to an anesthesia machine. This feeds oxygen, air, and the anesthetic gas to the patient. The anesthesia doctor controls the patient’s breathing, blood pressure, and heart rhythm, as well as other various, vital parameters, and the fluids that will be fed to the patient throughout the surgery. By doing this, the continuity of the anesthesia is made possible. When the surgery is over, the anesthetic drugs are no longer fed to the patient. When the muscle relaxants lose their effect and breathing returns to normal, the endotracheal tube is taken out and the patient is taken to another room to wake up. This is where the patient opens their eyes; it’s almost like a re-birth.

The chemicals in cannabis, opium, and coca were the essence of the first drugs used for general anesthesia; they are still being used, partially, in modern times. These chemicals, and some synthetic chemicals like them, are used for anesthesia and can be used after surgery in order to soothe pain. Most of our contemporary drugs are mostly synthetic, and they require many years of difficult education to be properly handled. It takes four years of additional education, after medical school, for a surgeon to become proficient with anesthetics.

Medical research done in the last two centuries about the dosage and quantity of these chemicals has advanced the practice of anesthesia incredibly. All this research provides a very good answer to why drugs have been created. While surgeons use the chemicals extracted from cannabis, opium, and coca, and from the synthetic chemicals like them, as a service to humanity, it is really hard to understand why some ill intentioned people use them for the detriment of human health.

Today we seem to accept that “reality is a construct” made up of meaning and values, a moment in the life of human consciousness, both at the individual and social level. The dynamic character of what we call “reality” has implications on our understanding of culture, science and man.

Culture is now understood as the set of symbols and values that constitute the virtual horizon that validates the reasonableness of human actions. By the same token, the principles of science are as valid as the arrival of other principles that revolutionize the preceding ones. Science no longer seeks necessary laws but rather the best available explanations about the universe that is today understood as open, dynamic and evolving.

Man is seen as a unity in tension, holder of a polymorphic consciousness that shapes his understanding according to a set of unconscious and preconscious processes that determine his intentions and decisions. He is known to also possess a consciousness with an unrestricted desire to know and a criterion allowing him to examine himself as he examines reality around him, simultaneously. This unrestricted desire to know leads him to an unrestricted objective: being.

This new way of viewing our own universe has two important implications: the acceptance of diversity and the forward looking mentality of man in almost every aspect of life. The forward looking character of man is associated with dramatic breakthroughs in science and the challenge of important paradigms of humanity, including the fact that this is the first time in history where human inventions and life styles can even extinguish all life on the planet.

In relation to diversity, post-modernity tends to be more colorful, heterogeneous, ecological and multi-religious than modernity. And in relation to looking into the future, the construction of things like a global civilization seem to form part of the feasible horizon to man.

Throughout human history, two things have characterized what is new: a process of simultaneous unity and conflict with what already exists, and the fact that the new state of being is not necessarily better than its predecessor. Post modernity is united with modernity in the sense that it requires the preservation of the critical spirit of the Enlightenment. However, the two eras are separated in the criticism of what can be called the “superstitions of modernity”, namely that future solutions lie only in the application of ever growing doses of science and technology, and in the repression of religious instinct and of religion in general.

There is no guarantee that this new era we are calling post-modernity will be better than the previous one. The future that opens before us can be one of a “clash of civilizations” or a time where future generations will acknowledge as an era of global splendor. The fact of the matter is that we have already left the modern “comfort zone” a long time ago. We are on a trip into the unknown and depending on how well we are equipped for this journey, we stand a better or worse chance of arriving at a safe harbor.

As with any journey, regardless of how well or how little of it we know, it is important to understand what the destination might be. We have already said that the destination of post-modernity is in the quest for meaning and being. And the reason is simple: modernism was based on progress as a paradigm and the supremacy of man over himself and nature. That is, human intelligence promised to liberate us from political oppression, provide a higher standard of living, and attain “perfection” in every field of life through the application of human mastery over knowledge, science, and technology.

Modernity appeared as a reaction to the backward looking world of the Renaissance. Post modernity in contrast, is a quest for meaning. This quest is not a return to the past and starts with achievements of human consciousness that are worth preserving, like the fight for justice, freedom and equality, and against intellectual and religious obscurantism. This quest is making a special impact on re-signifying paradigms and conquests of modernity. All over the world, thousands of people are modifying their understanding about democracy, technological progress, high standard of living and reason.

This important process of soul-searching in our times is taking place amidst spiritually-mindful people all over the world. For them, the times we live in are not the “end of history.” On the contrary, self complacency with the so-called achievements of modernity in science and communication underscores the importance of social justice, care for the planet and transcendence as pillars of a new world, since this cannot be the end of history so long as there are wars, hunger and injustice.

As the chances for economic and political systems to be radically transformed are high today, spiritually-mindful people will play a very large role in this transformation. The main reason for this is that truly spiritually-mindful people have little to no expectation in the so-called “comfort zones” because they always live to balance between what they know and the expectation of a world that has been promised to them by God. Whatever the culture he or she may have been born into, the seeker of the Truth is sensitive to the emerging probabilities where the human condition can be improved and they opt for them.

In this unconditional commitment for dynamic love lies the freedom of the spiritually-mindful person. This love is not only limited to the act of knowing but also to the act of choosing. He or she knows that unless action is undertaken, the elements that constitute a new world will never come to be. In the ethic to permanently destabilize his or her own self with already acquired ideas about the world, religion and culture, in thought and action, is implied the contribution of spiritually-mindful people to the world that is opening before us today.

A caveat however is that believers do not seem to be united across religions and cultures. Despite progress in communication, increased religious dialogue and an openness to alterity, there is little concerted interfaith action. Yet, this will only change in time if spiritually-mindful people can adequately identify and correct the many biases existing in every belief structure that in the name of God, have kept separation and strife amongst religions.

Human consciousness today is in need of an active and meaningful recognition of religious diversity. For some religions like Islam, such recognition has been established since its foundation, but has not been always followed in some regions and times in history. The same applies for Eastern philosophies and religions that have focused particularly on the discovery of God inside the heart of man. However regarding Christianity, which has only after 1965 recognized that salvation is possible outside of the Church, there is still a lot of progress to be made.

In the new world that is opening before us, it is probable that religions will not live side by side to each other in a juxtaposed manner as they do today. Instead, growing numbers of people will be able to make a clear distinction between the diverse manifestations of the names of God, and the way in which they have been interpreted and communicated. They will be more aware about the things that unite religions than the ones that separate them.

This will ultimately enrich all of them. There is a lot to be learned in the religious sense from the Arab Spring in the Middle East or from the many types of theologies that have evolved out of Vatican II all over the word or from the many teachings of Eastern beliefs. It is time for spiritually-inclined people all over the world to raise their heads and watch what their brothers from other religions are doing, inspired by the spirit of love and mercy. These people should speak to one another as this can only contribute to make the quality of their faith grow stronger.

All religions have prophets and saints that stand as a common heritage of humanity. Today, there are many people in every religion whose devotion, love of God and mankind, and heroism should be known and praised by all. They have a series of qualities important to the present quest into post modernity: they teach us that it is necessary to leave the “comfort zone” advertised by many worldly powers, they set the example in terms of the authenticity of their actions and they inspire us to transform ourselves from the inside as a precondition to make changes on the outside possible and meaningful.

In synthesis, a new world is emerging in a dialectics of many powerful forces: economic, political, military, scientific and social. A new force is required in the process: a divine spiritual guidance. This force that is depended on by millions of spiritually-mindful people is crucial, for they are in a privileged position to stand their ground on the basis of the authenticity of the process. They have not only evolved interested patterns of knowing and deciding, but by the nature of their belief, they seek a disinterested desire to know which is aimed at an unrestrictive objective, which is the finality of mankind as it unfolds into the universe of being.

Juan Fernando Lucio, a former adviser to presidential candidate Sergio Fajardo in Colombia, has advised on peace and reconciliation issues and done extensive research on the foundations of interfaith dialogue. He is currently an independent consultant and does research on the topic of liberation in contemporary religious thought.

According to truth-seeking scholars, ihsan (perfect goodness) is an action of the heart that involves thinking according to the standards of truth; forming the intention to do good, useful things and then doing them; and performing acts of worship as best as possible and in the consciousness that God sees them. To attain perfect goodness, an initiate must establish his or her thoughts, feelings, and concepts on a firm belief, and then deepen that belief by practicing the essentials of the religion and training his or her heart to receive Divine gifts and be illuminated by the light of His manifestations. Only one who has attained such a degree of perfect goodness can really do good to others just for the sake of God, without expecting anything in return.

According to a Prophetic saying, perfect goodness is that you worship God as if you were seeing Him; for even if you do not see Him, He certainly sees you. The most comprehensive and precise meaning of perfect goodness is that there is no fault in an initiate’s action, and that he or she is always conscious that God is always watching. An initiate must concentrate on his or her actions with all of his or her will, feelings, awareness, and outer and inner senses. An initiate who is aware of God’s supervision to this degree, and who therefore strives to act in the best way possible, cannot help but do good to others. Doing good to others then becomes an essential attribute of his or her nature, and radiates as light radiates from the sun.

Ihsan, in the sense of doing good to others, is summed up in the Prophet’s principle of desiring for one’s fellow believer whatever one desires for oneself. Its universal dimension is defined in the following Prophetic Tradition:

Surely, God has decreed that you excel in whatever you do. When you lawfully punish someone by killing, do it kindly; when you slaughter an animal, slaughter it kindly. Let him who will slaughter it sharpen his knife and avoid giving the animal much pain.

Consciousness of goodness is like a mysterious key that opens the door of a virtuous circle. An initiate who opens that door and steps into that illuminated corridor enters the “spiral” of a mysterious ascension, as if stepping onto an escalator. In addition to being endowed with this virtue, the correct use of one’s free will to do good and refrain from evil will result in an advance of two steps for each step taken: Is the reward of excellence other than excellence? (55:60). As we read in commentaries on the Qur’an or books of the Prophetic Traditions:

Once God’s Messenger, upon him be peace and blessings, he who was truthful and confirmed, asked his Companions about the verse: Do you know what Your Lord means by this verse? The Companions answered: God and His Messenger know better. He explained: The reward of the one upon whom I conferred belief in Divine Unity is nothing but Paradise.

When the consciousness of goodness invades one’s heart like clouds of rain, Divine favors begin to pour down. The possessor of such a heart, addressed by the verse: For those who do good is the greatest good, and even more (10:26), feels the profound pleasure of having been created as a human being.

In addition to the blessings of Divine grace in return for good actions, Divine gifts issue from God’s Graciousness and Kindness in return for a heart’s sincere intention. We are unable to conceive of or describe such gifts.

A sound heart leads one straight to God without any deviation, and goodness is the heart’s greatest and most rewarding action. Goodness is the safest way to ascend the slopes of sincerity, the most secure means to reach the peaks of being approved by God, and the consciousness of self-possession before the Eternal Witness. Of the many people equipped with belief, as well as deep fear and reverence for Him, who have taken the wings of good action and set out toward Him, only a few succeed in reaching the peak. May those who have not yet reached it try their utmost to do so. Those who have reached the peak feel deeply the ugliness of whatever God dislikes and are immune to it, while they are ready to do whatever He likes and to adopt such as their second nature.

O God! Favor us with a good, happy end in all our affairs, and save us from humiliation in the world and punishment in the Hereafter. Assign for us from awe of You such amount that it may intervene between us and any disobedience to You. And bestow blessings and peace on Muhammad, our master and the master of those distinguished with perfect goodness, and on his Family and Companions, all of them.

We can also interpret muraqaba as trying to observe whatever God wills, and leading a life in unwavering sincerity and in the consciousness of His constant supervision. Such an attitude is possible when the servant knows that the Almighty is aware of all that he or she does, says, knows, and thinks, as stated in the Qur’an: In whatever state you may be, and whichever part of the Qur’an you recite, and whatever deed you do, We are witnesses over you when you are deeply engrossed therein (10:61).

If muraqaba means closing one’s heart to all that displeases Him and separates one from Him, and opening the spirit to receive the radiances, gifts, and favors coming from Him, then we must close what we must and open what we must. The first steps to muraqaba are to accept as great what God has decreed as great, to accept as worthless what He has decreed as worthless, and to prefer His Will and desires over our own. Thinking of the depth of God’s Mercy increases and strengthens one’s love of God and desire to worship Him, and fear and awe of Him causes one to lose any appetite for sin and to live a careful life. Muraqaba leads men and women to discard anything that harms their worship, and to maintain the purity of their thoughts, actions, and intentions even when they are alone, in the consciousness of His continual observation.

Muraqaba is one of the most important and direct ways of reaching God without a guide. It resembles the type of sainthood attained through succession to the Prophetic mission, which is conveying the Divine Message to people, without following a spiritual order. Such travelers can turn to God at any time or place in awareness of their helplessness and destitution, and be admitted to a “private meeting” with Him based on their need. They feel God’s constant supervision while they are watching nature, and so avoid whatever is other than Him; they are deaf to all sounds and voices that are not related to Him; and they praise His Beauty and Grace, and regard it as useless to mention something that is not concerned with Him.

As a matter of fact, if one’s eyes do not remind one of His Seeing, one’s ears of His Hearing, and one’s tongue of His Speech, how can these organs be used other than as pieces of flesh? Rumi says:

God Almighty described Himself as the All-Seeing in order to warn you against evil, He described Himself as the All-Hearing to admonish you not to say anything bad, and He described Himself as the All-Knowing to inform you that He knows you and therefore to exhort you to be alert to corrupt thoughts and considerations.

Rumi regards self-supervision as a protecting screen from evil emotions, thoughts, passions, and acts, and considers it the safest way to be attentive to Divine rights.

The first step in self-supervision is voluntary submission to the Divine Will and wishes in the conviction that He is present everywhere and is aware of all our thoughts, intentions, and deeds: God is Watcher over all things (33:52). The second step is to turn to God with a heart at rest and patiently anticipate the flow of Divine gifts and blessings into one’s heart.

This does not require any physical or spiritual attachment to or relationship with a guide, or the regular recitation of God’s Names. However, if one wishes to follow a guide and regularly recite His Names in accordance with the defined principles, it will certainly be much better. To the extent that an initiate, whether on the first or second step, can act according to the meaning of the Prophetic Tradition: “Perfect goodness is that you worship as if seeing God, for even if you do not see Him, He certainly sees you,”1 and that, always seeing himself or herself as helpless, destitute, and needy before God, believes Him to be the sole point of reliance and source of help, he or she may be traveling safely on the path of self-supervision and therefore be secure against deviation. Over time, those who follow such a path will acquire a peace of heart that will allow their conscience to remain open to Divine gifts and receive radiances from the One of Unity.

One of the most important mechanisms of self-supervision is muhasaba (self-criticism). As this method of self-control allows believers to become aware of personal faults and their causes, they can find the truth in their hearts and then display it in their conduct. In this spirit, the meaning and mystery of: Glory be to Him Who sees me, knows my place and hears my speech manifests itself. Such people know that the Divine Knowledge and Will always keep them under control and, regardless of location or action, seek only God’s pleasure by trying to act in accordance with His wishes.

Note

1. Al-Bukhari, Iman, 37; Muslim, Iman, 1.

The first group of people carry a “pump” in their chests, but it cannot be said that they have hearts. The second group of people live in the cloudy, misty atmosphere of their surmises and doubts, separate from God, and are unable to reach their destination. The third group of people, those who have traveled some distance toward the destination, are at risk because they have not yet reached the goal. They advance falteringly, struggling on the way of God, experience cycles of defeat and success, and spend their lives trying to climb a “hill” without being able to reach the summit.

On the other hand, those who have a firm belief live as if they see God and in the consciousness that God sees them, enjoy complete security and are under God’s protection. They study existence with insight, penetrate the nature of existence, discover their reality through the light of God, and behave soberly and with self-control. They tremble with fear of God, full of anxiety and hope concerning their final goal, and pursue His pleasure by seeking to please Him and living in a way that shows their love for Him. In return, God loves them and causes other believers to love them. They are loved and esteemed by humanity and the jinn, and receive a warm welcome wherever they happen to be.

Prophet Joseph, upon him be peace, the truthful hero of Sura Yusuf, is mentioned five times in this sura as a man of perfect goodness and deep devotion. All of creation, including the Creator and the created, friend and foe, Earth and the heavens, testified to his strict self-control and self-supervision: When Joseph reached his full manhood, We bestowed on him wisdom and knowledge. Thus do We reward those who are perfectly good [worshipping and acting in consciousness of being always seen by God] (Yusuf 12:22). Here, the Almighty states that Prophet Joseph was a man of perfect goodness and self-control at the age of puberty. During his imprisonment in Egypt, every prisoner, whether good or evil, discerned the depth of his mind and purity of his spirit, and appealed to him to solve their problems: Tell us the interpretation of events, including dreams, for we see you [to be] among those who are perfectly good (Yusuf 12:36). Joseph succeeded in every trial he faced, and won a place in everyone’s heart, both friend and foe.

Once more God mentions him as a man of perfect goodness, a perfect embodiment of goodness, as his character did not change when appointed to a high government post: Thus We established Joseph in the land, to take possession of it where he pleased. We reach with Our mercy whom We will, and We never cause to be lost the reward of those who are perfectly good [worshipping and acting in consciousness of being always seen by God] (Yusuf 12:56). When his brothers, who had always envied him, acknowledged his goodness and truthfulness even before they discovered that the charitable minister in the royal palace of Egypt was Joseph. They said: O exalted sir. He has a father, aged and venerable; so take one of us instead of him, for we see that you are among those who are perfectly good (Yusuf 12:78).

Lastly, as a man perfectly matured and having acquired full spiritual contentment, Prophet Joseph himself testified to God’s blessings on him: God has been indeed gracious to us. Whoever acts in fear of God and full submission to Him and is patient, surely God does not waste the reward of those who are perfectly good (Yusuf 12:90).

It is inconceivable that an individual with such a sound heart could deviate or be deprived of God’s blessing. Such a heart has the same meaning with respect to its owner as God’s Supreme Throne has with respect to the universe, and is a polished mirror in which the Almighty looks in full appreciation. Such a mirror is not something to be discarded or allowed to break, for it is the essence and spirit of human reality and is praised by God.

In the following couplets, Rumi recalls this:

The Truth says: I consider the heart,
Not the form made from water and clay.
You say: I have a heart within me, whereas
The heart is above God’s Throne, not below.

“Ever since the beginnings of modern science, four or five hundred years ago, scientific thoughts seem to have moved humankind and consciousness further from the centre of things. More and more of the universe has become explicable in mechanical, objective terms and even human beings are becoming understood by biologists and behavioral scientists. Now we find that physics, previously considered the most objective of the sciences, is reinventing the need for the human soul and putting it right at the centre of our understanding of the universe!” (Rae 2004)

The last century has witnessed a new scientific approach with the development of the quantum theory. The theory has been tested to such a degree that it has become the scientific theory on which the most experiments have been carried out of all time. Probably this is partly due to the fact that it is the most mind-provoking theory to date. Nevertheless, the new theory has passed all these tests and has been confirmed as being more complete in explaining the cosmos than any previous theory. The quantum theory has shown that the old approach of a mechanical universe was an oversimplification employed to explain the physics of the universe. One of the most important consequences of this is that the quantum theory refutes the main foundations of positivist philosophy. This philosophy sees the universe consisting of what we can observe or measure, with everything beyond not being real. This denial also applied to knowledge that came from religions, and this resulted in the present conflict between religion and science. However, today even modern science says that the universe cannot be limited to what we observe. The very basic principles of quantum physics show the possibility that the vast majority of life or the states of life are beyond the scope of our observations and that we have no way of knowing about them via physical means.

Although positivist philosophy dates back to the 16th century, it was August Comte who defined it in a systematic way in the mid-19th century. The Harper-Collins dictionary defines Positivism as “the view that all true knowledge is scientific.” Positivism includes the view of reductionism which claims that everything in the universe, including astrophysical systems, complex biological systems, social movements, cultural values, and belief systems can all be reduced to simple physical and chemical events. Probably one of the most unfortunate outcomes of this approach was the questioning of belief systems with the tools of the scientific method. In one of his articles Fethullah Gulen says:

“The massive influence of positivism and materialism on science and on all people of recent centuries makes it necessary to discuss such arguments. As this now-prevalent “scientific” worldview reduces existence to what can be perceived directly, it blinds itself to the far vaster invisible dimensions of existence.”(Gulen 2006)

Such arguments against religion that spring from materialism have gone worldwide, and all religious faiths have been questioned. Even the faithful has been confused by these arguments, consciously or unconsciously. Although scientific knowledge should be only one source of knowledge, it was considered to be the only source. In Huston Smith’s words, this was a “blank check” to science to make decisions (Smith 2001).

It should be clarified that the early founders of both classical and modern physics did not perceive science in a positivist way. Copernicus and Newton at the birth of classical physics and Einstein, Dirac, and Planck at the birth of modern physics, all had religious convictions and envisioned science as a part of knowledge. Einstein was even accused of being a theologian in disguise by some scientific historians. It was the positivist philosophy which took advantage of the scientific developments and used it against religion, resulting in the apparent conflict today. However, new developments in science have proven that the basic assumptions of positivism are no longer valid from a modern perspective. Thus positivism should be nothing but an outdated ideology.

From quantum physics to metaphysics

Quantum mechanical behavior emerges when one observes phenomena at microscopic scales. One of its novelties can be seen in that it offers a more comprehensive atomic model. The new atomic model has very important applications to our life, ranging from making lasers to producing computer chips. The early understanding of an atom was that there was a nucleus at the center and electrons circulating around it, like in the planetary systems (the Bohr model). Although this was a great achievement at the time it was proposed, later scientists realized that classical physics cannot explain the circulation of the electron around the nucleus. In such a model the electron should lose energy and eventually collapse into the nucleus.

In the quantum mechanical definition the electron is more like a wave around the nucleus than a particle. So the electron is not really a particle orbiting around the nucleus, but rather more like a cloud that is spread evenly around. Sometimes the electron is called a particle because it acts like a particle in some experiments. As seen in this example, in a quantum mechanical measurement we cannot find an answer to “what the electron really is,” but rather we find an answer to “how it responds to a particular setup.” The actual stuff is a neither a particle nor a wave. We are rather measuring one form of its behavior which is compatible with our experimental system. Then according to the quantum theory, there is no a way to completely understand this actual stuff with measurements.

Above we gave the famous measurement problem, which forms the heart of the quantum theory. Although what we are dealing with looks like a physical problem, “the measurement problem” has far reaching philosophical consequences. The basic problem is that we need to know what this actual stuff looks like so that we can have an answer to the question of “what it really is.” However, any explanation should be able to explain the transition from a quantum physical system into the macroscopic system in which we live so that we can have a meaningful model. Otherwise, paradoxes are inevitable (you can read about the famous Schrödinger’s cat thought experiment if you are interested.)

The most complete and satisfying answer comes from the Copenhagen interpretation (Frayn 2000). It was proposed by Neil Bohr, one of the prominent figures in the development of the theory. Debates lasting for months or longer, especially between N. Bohr and A. Einstein, ended up with the victory of Bohr’s ideas. According to the Copenhagen interpretation, the actual stuff is neither a wave nor a particle but is something not physical; rather it exists only in knowledge. This knowledge collapses into a physical state when somebody measures it. So the new theory suggests a very abstract approach to the universe as opposed to the old mechanical model. The famous astrophysicist Sir James Jeans wrote,

“The stream of knowledge is heading towards a non-mechanical reality; the Universe begins to look more like a great thought than like a great machine. Human mind no longer appears to be an accidental intruder into the realm of matter.” (Jeans 2002)

Scientists think that the true picture of the actual stuff can never be completely understood in this physical universe because we are limited by our physical tools. There may be other states, but we have no tools to understand them or get to know about them since we are limited by the tools of this universe. This is the point where the new physics talks about other dimensions which are beyond the observable and measurable universe. But this is exactly what philosophy calls “metaphysics.” So we see that the new physics not only accepts the existence of other metaphysical realms, but it even says that they must exist for completeness!

The necessity of human consciousness

A concern comes to mind about what is unique in this measurement process that results in the ultimate transition from a knowledge system into a physical system. How can the detector in an experiment result in this transition? The answer from the Copenhagen interpretation is very surprising. The detector cannot be the cause for this transition, because it does not make any changes in the system before or after the measurements are carried out. That is, these tools we use to make the measurements do not change anything in the nature of the system. Not even the eyes of the observers or the brain that is making this measurement can do this, as they are no different than the experimental apparatus, except that they are more complex. They are just part of the experimental system in this chain, like mechanical detectors. The chain continues until it ends up in the human consciousness, which is something non-material as any physical identification would put it in the same category as the previous members of the chain. Then the unique role of the human action enters the system; measurement is part of the knowledge in the mind. With this measurement, the human consciousness becomes aware of it. This is the unique property that the human being has which cannot be attributed to any other objects and it plays a central role in the interpretation of the quantum theory.

We infer that human consciousness is something immaterial and behaves quite differently than any other entity in the universe. Interestingly, the distinction of the physical and spiritual side of human beings is found in the teaching of religions, which we now see in the context of modern physics. This is a very important reconciliation between science and religion and it is also reassuring that we are not like any other objects in the universe!

Is materialism coming to the end?

With the new developments in physics, a materialistic worldview seems to be a simple look at life and existence. We remember the classic statement of materialistic philosophy “I only believe what I can see or measure in the laboratory.” Quantum physics would respond to this by saying: “it is not that simple!” We see that there are no contradictions between the new physics and the teachings of religions. We do not know how God creates life in hereafter, hell, and heaven. But one thing we do know is that their existence does not contradict the modern scientific worldview. Also the realms of invisible creatures (like angels and the devil) and their interactions with our physical world cannot be understood with science. Modern physics says we should not seek knowledge of these through science. They can only be known by what is told to us in our holy books and by the prophets.

The extreme approach of materialism to the human being is that the human is the most complexly evolved biological mechanism in the universe and in theory its consciousness and other feelings can be reduced into chemical reactions. This approach is in complete contradiction with modern physics. Modern physics says the human being is totally distinguished from other beings with their non-material consciousness. So we see that modern science removes the human being from the ignorance of materialism and puts it into the center of the universe. This is the same thing that religions have been saying since the creation of Adam and Eve!

As people of the 21st century, we can see that the discoveries of modern science does not contradict faith. We see that modern science is widening its horizons by identifying metaphysics as being part of the reality. In the words of the 20th century scholar Said Nursi, “…the light of conscience is religious sciences. The light of the mind is modern sciences. Reconciliation of both manifests the truth. The student’s skills develop further with these two (sciences). When they are separated, from the former superstition and from the latter corruption and skepticism is born.” A similar statement by Einstein is “…I cannot conceive of a genuine scientist without that profound faith. The situation may be expressed by an image: science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.”

References

• Rae, Alastair. Quantum Physics: Illusion or Reality, Cambridge: 2004.
• Gulen, M. Fethullah, Questions and Answers about Islam, The Light, Inc., NJ: 2006.
• Smith, Huston. Why Religion Matters: The Fate of the Human Spirit in an Age of Disbelief, HarperSanFrancisco: 2001.
• Frayn, Michael. Copenhagen, Anchor:2000.
• Jeans, Sir James. The Mysterious Universe, The Macmillan Company, 1932.
• Henry, Richard Conn. “The Mental Universe,” Nature, 436, 7 July 2005.

Therefore, we must work within the Islamic world with its understanding of faith; its own acceptance and interpretation of Islam; its consciousness of the good; its zeal and yearning for spiritual ecstasy; its reason, logic, mode and system of thinking; its style of expressing and communicating itself; and its own institutions, which will lead to a comprehensive renewal. The fundamentals of our spiritual life, religious thought and imagination are responsible for our past success. Religion gives meaning to humanity and the universe, explains us to ourselves, and embraces and influences every aspect of our individual and collective life.

The axis of all believers’ acts is worship, which is directed toward the Hereafter and seeking God’s good pleasure. There is no “this world/that world” or “mind/heart” dichotomy, for the believers’ emotions and reason are united and their understanding does not ignore their inspiration. So in their mental world, experience stretches up to the mind and knowledge is a high bastion, reinforced with understanding, wisdom, and intuition. Their understanding contains no gap.

Religion does not contradict science and reason and cannot be blamed for clashes among social sections. Such conflicts arise from ignorance, ambition, or vested interests. Clashes between religious people occur because they do not have the same degree of belief and so cannot preserve sincerity or overcome their feelings. Indeed, such conflicts can be avoided only by establishing religion and its institutions in our daily life so that it becomes our society’s life-blood.

The Islamic community needs to be revived by combining serious efforts to preserve Islam’s original principles with the Qur’an’s extensiveness and universality, so that it meets the needs of all people in all times and places, and so that it embraces all facets of life. Islamic history has recorded many renewals, reforms, and revivals. Legal schools represented new developments in jurisprudence and law, Sufi orders turned paths to the heart and the soul into broad highways, and our schools and colleges sought to make sense of the universe and its inhabitants. This latest renewal and revival must combine all of these, for without turning to certainty in faith, sincerity in deeds, and excellence in thought and feeling, it will not occur.

All acts of worship should be performed completely and as outlined in the Qur’an and Sunna. Words should be the means of prayer, and soul and sincerity are essential; the Sunna should be the guide and consciousness a necessity. Only God should be the goal, for if these acts are not performed as required, how are they different from comparable mundane activities?

Somehow, we must mobilize ourselves to raise the physicians of the soul and essential reality who can fill this vacuum in us, eradicate our weaknesses, rescue us from being slaves to our body and carnal desires, and direct us to a level of life in the heart and the soul. We need physicians of spirit and essence, spirit, and reality, physicians whose hearts are open to all fields of knowledge and all spiritual inspirations and Divine blessings. In short, we need whole comprehensive minds.

Such people must be in constant contact and interaction with the atoms, molecules, and particles of the people, just as the mind is in constant contact with the body. They will embrace everyone. By conveying the messages of their soul to all and elevating them to the level of people who have knowledge, skills, and genius for the future, they will present them for the common good and society’s benefit. They will purify everyone of the foulness of the age and guide them toward human perfection.

Moreover, they will transform the media into the voice and breath of social and religious life, and use it to teach the owners of the darkest feelings, thoughts, and voices how to become human. And they will save our educational and training institutions by once again making them open and responsive to the requirements of the present, reorder and organize them according to historical perspectives, and raise them, through the use of styles, methodologies, and planning of a high standard, to a higher level.

Thus we will rise as a society from the misery of rigid and empty formalism to true scientific understanding; from dignifying diverse vile and disgraceful works with the title of “art” to true art and aesthetics; from customs, addictions, and obsessions of unknown origin to the consciousness of a morality based on history and religion; from the snares of various gnawing thoughts in our hearts to the oneness of service, submission, consciousness, and resignation.

Capitalism, communism, socialism, the hybrids of social democracy, and liberalism have nothing new to offer. Our world is open to the new world order. It might even be our renaissance. This revival will make our world of thinking and feeling, and also our understanding of art and aesthetics, gain a heretofore unknown depth and variety. We will find our own aesthetic pleasures, reach our own music, and discover our own romanticism. In short, we will secure our people’s future.

Our flag will be effort and dynamism; our source of strength will be our consciousness of faith and truth. We will no longer have to look for handouts, for we will regain our honor and remain honorable only by holding fast to our own values and surrendering wholeheartedly to God.

Toward Our Own World

Many eras and lands have seen movements that claimed to be reformations and reconstructions. Such claims have always been controversial. One domain is now ripe for a genuine reformation that will embrace all creation: the Muslim world.

Once, almost all of the natural and religious sciences, from Sufism to logic, as well as from urban planning to aesthetics, were embodied in geniuses who studied phenomena in minute detail. Such names are too many to mention here. By mobilizing all of our brilliant minds and souls, Muslims may soon realize a second or third renaissance. Yes, we will start by recognizing Islam’s soul and essence, spirit and reality, and reach toward the re-interpretation of existence, from the boundless Divine climates of Sufism to universal metaphysics; from Islamic self-accounting and self-control to the vigilance, circumspection, and self-possession that make humanity gain value; from the cities and urbanization, in which our inner world takes repose and breathes, to the aesthetics that will be the property of all; from the art that embroiders the soul and essence, spirit, and reality everywhere and seeks infinity in all that it embroiders, to the true pleasures of an aesthetic, which becomes more and more other-worldly and refined, and integrates with the beyond. By all of these means, we can open a new chapter.

Our spiritual life has been to a large part extinguished for many years; our religious world has become dysfunctional; our hearts’ tongues have been tied as people have forgotten intense, ecstatic love and spiritual ecstasy; we have transformed all minds that read and think into minds devoted to a hard positivism; bigotry has been built instead of firmness of character, strength of religion, and perseverance in truth. Even in asking for the Hereafter and Paradise, petitioners have in mind some continuation of this world’s ordinary happiness. It is therefore impossible to open a new chapter without ripping such misdirected, deep-rooted thoughts and considerations out of ourselves.

This does not mean that the foulness that has sullied our souls for centuries cannot be eradicated. However, as this foulness caused us to fall, we must get rid of it before we can make any progress. For example, we must abandon our greed, laziness, ambition for fame, selfishness and worldly-mindedness, and replace these with the spirit of contentedness, willpower and courage, modesty and humility, altruism and spirituality, piety and godliness, all of which are the essence and truth of Islam.

Fortunately, we have such heroes among us, and the renewal and change that they will bring about will be shaped by the Qur’an and tempered by human nature. Both its enemies and the masses will be unable to prevent it, for history proves that only a few individual geniuses bring about a renaissance. Such people, who have emerged with a complete spiritual awareness in almost every age, established schools of law and schools of thought, both of which breathed the spirit of reconstruction and reform into the masses. Their successors followed them and their thoughts, as did the masses that sheltered in their enlightened climate. Such great guides became the people’s life-blood and soul, and lived with them like a spirit. In their absence, society and the people declined.

Now, as the days turn to spring and dawn chases dawn, we are becoming hopeful and expectant, praying to our Lord: “Grant us willpower supported by your Will, which will be the foundation of our souls. Make our hearts blossom as the flowers in Paradise, and make our souls reach the secrets of the innermost part of Your Divinity. Show our people the ways to revival in the Muhammadi line.” To ask for and expect this is both our right and duty, the natural consequence of our faith. However, we must refer frequently to our glorious past and take shelter in the values that made it magnificent. This is the way that other civilizations renewed themselves.

As long as we can recover our thoughts, feelings, methodology, and philosophy, it will be enough to bring them together to find our heavenly and immortal style. Thus, we should first re-examine all of the roads that we will take, and then repair and reinforce them. We must cultivate the inspiration and fruitfulness of religious longing and desire, firmness, gravity, sobriety, and wisdom in our reasoning and logic; stability and humanity, with the freedom to be ourselves; philosophical depth, refinement, and contemplative abstraction in our arts and philosophy. All of these should be logical at their core and inspired by revelation.

God’s good pleasure is the ultimate goal. The soul is before and ahead of the body. The self is an essential dynamism that will ignite the consciousness of duty under the heart’s rule. The love of humanity and country is an indispensable passion, and the duty to be moral is a vital provision for the journey. We must adhere to the Qur’an, and recognize humanity’s character and real human values as significant sources of power. Goals and objectives must be just, fair, and sacred, and the ways leading to them must be indicated by the Qur’an and the Sunna.